


Dream Girl

by litra



Category: For the People (TV 2018)
Genre: F/M, First Meetings, Meet-Cute, Party, Podfic Welcome, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-02
Updated: 2019-02-02
Packaged: 2019-10-21 03:59:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17635613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/litra/pseuds/litra
Summary: Seth and Allison meat at a party, and now he can't get her out of his head.





	Dream Girl

**Author's Note:**

  * For [365paperdolls](https://archiveofourown.org/users/365paperdolls/gifts).



Seth looked around the glittering party. It was high class and tasteful and everything you'd expect from a party thrown by a pair of senators, who invited their golfing buddies, and bridge clubs. There were lawyers, college professors, and CEOs as well as the aforementioned senators in attendance. Everyone was trying to outdo each other with their expensive clothes and cars and stories.

Seth felt completely out of his depth.

He was only there as a tag along because a senior member of his firm thought it'd be good to show him the ropes. He'd been introduced to a few people, a glass had been pressed into his hand, and he'd spent the rest of the last hour propping up the wall. It didn't help that most of the people here were in their fifties and he was barely out of college. The first person he'd talked to had asked if he was an intern. 

This wasn't working. He looked down at his empty glass and decided, fuck it, at least there was an open bar.

He hadn't even had a chance to get the bartender's attention when a smoking hot black woman with a red dress and a rion of brown curls looped her arm through his. Seth took a breath trying to put together some words that would make sense.

"Please play along," she hissed befor raising her voice. "Oh here you are, I've been looking all over for you sweety." She sent a meaningful look over his shoulder. Seth followed her gaze. There was a man he vaguely placed as part of the mayor's group scowling at the woman. He was short, overweight, balding and far too old for the woman who had attached herself to him.

Seth smiled brightly at her, "Yeah, I'm sorry it took so long to get your drink. I got caught up talking to the district attorney." He wrapped an arm around her shoulders, trying to keep it casual while still acting his part. 

The bartender had noticed them and she ordered a glass of the red before he could fumble over what she wanted. "Two," he added.

His new date, leaned against him, and glanced over his shoulder again. She was frowning so the guy must not have gotten the hint. the bartender pushed over two wine glasses. 

"Do you want to get some air?" Seth offered.

Her smile was a bit strained, "Yeah, lets go."

The house had a sizable back lawn. Seth led his new date through the crowd, until they were at the very edge of the patio lights, before finally dropping his arm. The guy, whoever he'd been, hadn't followed.

The woman stepped away, wrapping her shawl tighter around herself as she looked around. The branches of a neatly trimmed willow sheltered them. An old swinging bench hung from the lower branches, Seth eyed it, wondering if it was safe to sit on. The woman didn't hesitate, lounging on the bench without any thought to her dress.

"Thank you. I don't normally need a rescue but he was--"

Seth waved off the apology, "I get it. I'm Seth by the way. I'm here with Nelson--" He started to offer his hand and then wondered if it was too late for that. He'd had his arms around her, that was a bit more intimate than a handshake...

"The Lawyer?" 

She didn't seem put off. In fact her eyes lit up in the gloom, suddenly really looking at him. In Seth's experience there were two kind of responses to finding out he was a lawyer, the first was disgust disguised to some degree. The 'kill all the lawyers' mentality. The other was greed, someone thinking he made a lot of money and didn't care about the hows or whys. Alison wasn't looking at him like that though, her back was straight and her chin up.

"Yes actually. That doesn't--" he waved a hand generally in a gesture that didn't know what it was, "bother you?"

She shook her head, "Not at all. I'm studying law myself. I know what you mean though. My parents had a very polite hissy fit when I told them what I was getting my doctorate in. I think they would have taken it better if I had told them I wanted to be one of those starving artists or joined a religious group. That at least they would have an logical argument against rather than just pregidace. Oh- I'm Allison by the way." She tacked on at the end.

Seth could feel his smile growing, "Allison, It's nice to meet you." He sat down next to her, testing the bench with one hand to make sure it would hold. "Where are you studying?"

They talked. Argued? Debated! She wanted to be a public defender. He was set on a job in the prosecutor's office hopefully within two years. She was from a rich family of academics. He was a more or less self made man, not that his family didn't have money but none of them had these kind of connections, not in New York. She was black, he was white - in a lot of different areas... and yet...

He wanted to see her again.

They had talked into the night, until her brother had come to find her and say their family was leaving. He waved her off, saying he had enjoyed talking to her. He'd been happy, lying in bed that night, watching the city lights on the ceiling and thinking about her.

He wanted to see her again.

"She must have been a great lay," Tony, one of his coworkers said.

"I didn't sleep with her.

"Seth, I say this as your friend. You really need to get laid," Martin said during a call back home.

"Shut up, I'm fine."

"That is some real life romance novel shit right there--" Allan said after work.

"Only if we actually end up together" Seth said into his beer. 

"So go find her."

He wanted to. He knew what doctorate program she was in, but not her phone number. She'd talked about her parents and her brother, but not where she lived. He hadn't wanted to google her. He didn't want to seem like a stalker or something. If she said to back off he would in a heartbeat, but that night had been nice. 

He wanted to see her again.

Seth had fallen in love twice in his life and he thought he'd gotten over that puppy love stage where everything was hearts and rainbows.She wasn't a princess for him to sing sonnets to, but he had to wonder how she would feel curled up against him while watching a movie, or sliding her arms around him in the kitchen the morning after.

"Oh my god, do you even realize how you sound?" Allan leaned back his eye roll exaggerated by the beers he'd had. "Like look, you could just-- what was her name again?" He was patting himself down looking for his wallet or something.

"Allison Adams... I think or maybe Allison Aston? It was two As... No it was definitely Adams--"

"Right," Alan interrupted, "and, whow, she is hot. At least you've got good taste man." Alan was looking at something on his phone. Seth panicked, reached for it, and they both ended up toppling off their bar stools, rolling across the floor. 

The bouncer politely asked them to leave.

Seth wasn't sure if Alan would remember everything the next morning. He also wasn't sure if Alan would do something terribly inappropriate like hitting on her through her facebook profile or sending her dick pics or something -- before he actually conked out.

Back in his apartment he bit his lip, and bit the bullet. Her facebook profile wasn't hard to find, though it looked like she only logged on every once in a while. It was linked to a twitter account and an instagram page which was mostly slightly artistic pictures of the New York skyline and a few pictures of food and wine.

_Hey, this is Seth,_

He paused in the middle of messaging her. What if she didn't remember him? They'd only met the once after all. He wouldn't blame her. Not everyone had a memory for names, or faces, or...

_From the Senator's party._

Shit, was that too much? No, he wasn't trying to come on to her. It had been a few weeks. It wasn't like that. He had an actual reason for doing all this.

_My friend Alan looked you up because I mentioned you so I just wanted to apologise if you get any weird drunk texts._

There, that was fine. He was just being a nice guy. She could brush him off or not, or whatever.

When he actually got a response within twenty minutes, he nearly jumped out of his seat.

_Yeah, I remember you. Don't worry, no weird messages._

Then before he could respond.

_We should get drinks sometime._

A smile lit up his face, _Yeah, I'd like to see you again._


End file.
